


Field Conditions

by significantowl



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Cuddling & Snuggling, Drinking, Drunken Kissing, Library makeouts, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-17
Updated: 2016-03-17
Packaged: 2018-05-27 08:43:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,926
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6277570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/significantowl/pseuds/significantowl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Foggy takes in a little bit of law, a lot of alcohol, and gets cuddled by a human koala.</p><p>(For a kinkmeme prompt requesting a Matt who can't keep his hands off Foggy when he's drunk.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Field Conditions

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks and blame (both, it's definitely both!) go to Capriccio and Elliceluella!♥
> 
> This happened because I saw the second s2 trailer and felt the overwhelming need to write something where Foggy's life was happy and uncomplicated (at least for the time being). And because I adored the prompt ♥

_7:16pm_

“Friday night compromise!” Foggy proclaims, because the debate that’s happening here is too ridiculous and it's gone on for too long. “Not the library _or_ drinking, but -”

“Foggy….”

“That's right, the library _and_ drinking! Pack up your laptop, put on your shoes. We’re rolling out.”

 

_7:48pm_

“Okay, I think we're safe from the all-seeing eyes,” Foggy says, scanning the ceiling for cameras one last time. The shelves down here are extremely tall and extremely cramped, and the whole floor is pretty much deserted - not just because it’s the cellar, and most people go for the windows when they can, but because it’s _Friday night_.

“They allow drinks in this library, Foggy.” Matt feels for the table and unshoulders his laptop bag. “Ah - outlet?”

“Yeah, but do they allow drunks? - Under the table, straight ahead.” He rustles in his bag while Matt gets settled in. He brought his laptop along too, he’ll consume law _and_ he’ll consume alcohol, that’s what makes him such a stellar compromiser, but it’s the bottles clinking around in his bag that he’s the most interested in. “Just a coincidence we ended up in the Foreign Law stacks, but I think it’s a good thing we’re surrounded by Russians. Thematically appropriate. Here.” He hands over Matt's stainless steel water bottle, the one he takes to the gym. 

Matt screws up his face a little, but accepts it. “Vodka, huh?”

“And juice! Never let it be said Foggy Nelson isn't looking out for your Vitamin C intake.”

Matt mutters darkly about pulp. Foggy uncaps his own bottle and takes his first sip.

 

_8:53pm_

“I see you smacking those lips, Murdock. I know you’re thirsty. And I know - and _you_ know - what you can do about it.”

Foggy really hopes Matt gets on with it, too, since watching _those_ lips do _that_ is causing Foggy active injury. And it’s not only watching them rub against each other, oh no, it's the way Matt's jaw moves inside his cheek as he works to moisten his mouth, and the tiny little swallows that travel down the column of his throat….

Tactical error, getting into the booze before Matt did. Foggy's defenses are a little more solid pre-buzz.

“You're right, I do.” Matt's voice scratches slightly over the words. “Water fountain’s by the elevator.”

“Nuh uh uh.” Foggy gets a hand on Matt’s wrist before he can get to his feet. “A deal’s a deal. Renege at this stage and the other party, that's me, gets damages. I'll take your cane. Don't think I won't.”

He really wouldn't, not ever, at least not for more than a drunken minute or two - it's possible one legendary evening may have included bouts of fencing against unsuspecting university lampposts - but the way Matt always smiles when Foggy says stuff like that is why he keeps saying it.

“All right, all right.” Matt's fingers find his bottle and he pops the cap. His first sip prompts a full-body shudder, and his eyebrows furrow over his glasses. 

“And since I know the ratio of spirits to juice in there is just -” Foggy kisses his fingertips - “ _perfection_ , I know that face is because you made the mistake of letting it get warm. Never dreamed you were such a rookie.”

“I can't drink this, Foggy.”

“Well, you can't pour it out! That would be disrespecting the booze, and there'll be none of that on my watch. You made your hot citrusy bed. You lie in it.”

To give Matt credit, he does it like a champ. He tips his head back and drinks steadily, throat moving in long swallows - crap, why must that be such a mesmerizing lure? If Matt can do this, why can't Foggy be strong enough to look away?

Matt slams the bottle on the table triumphantly. His tongue licks out at what must be a sticky place on his lip. “I assume you've come prepared with refills? And that they're chilled?”

“You assume correctly.” He's got one of those lunch bags with the freezer packs built right into it. Foggy Nelson is nothing if not prepared. 

And if the ratio of vodka to juice gets upped a little this time, who can blame him? He’s mixing beneath a table here. Field conditions. These things are to be expected.

Anyway, he suspects the Russians would approve.

 

_9:22pm_

At some point during the second drink, Matt slithers around to Foggy's side of the table. Which isn't exactly unexpected; whenever they're out drinking - or _in_ drinking, enjoying the incomparable ambiance of their dorm room - Matt tends to drift closer the more alcohol he consumes. The relationship between liquor and distance is definitely an inverse one in the world of Matt Murdock.

In their room, Foggy's always assumed it's the cozy factor coming into play. Sprawling on a bed together and sharing a bottle is just inherently more comfy than knocking back solo cups on opposite sides of the room. Out on the town, Foggy figures Matt’s looking for a little grounding. Bars are loud and crowded, and people stumble around and rearrange chairs and generally make Matt's life fucking complicated even before tipsiness enters the picture. After it does - well, Foggy's there.

And he's happy to be there in the library, too, more than happy, he's just maybe a teensy bit surprised. For starters, it's quiet here. Graveyard quiet, on a Friday night. For... more starters? second starters? - so what, maybe Foggy's losing eloquence, maybe his brain is going fuzzy around the edges, whatever, _alcohol_ \- this library is Matt’s home away from home. He probably knows the layout of it better than Foggy knows the back of his own hand.

For third starters - 

Well. It’s back to ambiance. Atmosphere. What doesn't look weird or feel weird beneath dim lighting in a beer-sticky wooden booth or perched on a wobbly stool comes a lot closer to strange under fluorescent lights in hard plastic library chairs. For one thing, Matt's not even entirely _in_ his own chair. Part of his thigh is definitely taking up real estate in Foggy’s. A warm, solid part of his thigh, pressed flush against Foggy's jeans.

Let the record show, it’s a very nice thigh.

But it’s not like that’s some kind of revelation. Foggy has met Matt’s thigh before: in those sticky barroom booths, in the back of occasional late-night cabs, lounging in front of a movie on Foggy’s bed. They’re just library friends now as well, apparently. 

It's cool. Foggy can make new library friends, enjoy an adult beverage, _and_ get his reading done for Richardson’s class. He’s good like that.

Matt’s still reading too, but the fact that he doesn’t need to orient his face towards his book is becoming an issue - specifically, an issue for Foggy, because suddenly Matt’s cheek is snugged up against Foggy’s shoulder, and he keeps shifting, nudging and burrowing around like a fox curling up in a nest. And - oh, okay, burrowing is a prelude to reading one-handed, because a minute or two later Matt’s got fingers nestled warmly in the crook of Foggy’s elbow. Foggy squints past the mess of dark hair on his shoulder, trying to get a better look. He’s so used to seeing Matt zip along two-handed that he wants to be sure Matt’s not skipping the right side of his page entirely, but no, of course he isn’t. Probably taking in a shitton more law than Foggy is at the moment, too. Dammit.

It's so quiet. It's easier not to be distracted by… _things_ when there's music or a terrible movie playing and you're having an important conversation about the proportion of Cheez to Whiz versus Cheez to It. (Matt holds the opinion that there is 0% actual cheese in either and no quantifiable legal definition to the terms “Whiz” or “It.” When Matt is tragically misguided, he has to be told.) But here it's quiet, and things -

Foggy is _reading_. Thighs are not on his radar. Shoulders and elbows are not on his radar. The weight of Matt’s head and the warmth of his hand and basically everything that’s happening on the left side of Foggy’s body are off the map completely.

Foggy knocks back some of his adult beverage. Clarity follows. No left side of his body? That's fine, no problem! Foggy has ascended. Transcended. Whatever. He is a being of pure thought.

He turns his head to inform Matt of this, but he's pretty sure the words that actually manage to stumble their way off his tongue - look, he mixed drink two, he _knows_ it’s taking no prisoners - just get lost somewhere in that territory he’s not charting, between his lips and the soft, soft strands of Matt's hair.

 

_9:42pm_

They're not alone anymore.

Foggy struggles to sit up higher in his chair. Marci's eyebrows can speak volumes, and that's just what they're doing, eloquent, knowing volumes that Foggy has no interest in reading.

Matt, oblivious to eyebrow language, does nothing to make Foggy's struggles any easier. He lifts his head and aims a look that's half piteous and half reproachful in Foggy's direction. "We have company," Foggy says, nudging at Matt gently, trying to encourage him back into his own chair. "Jael from Civil Procedure and Marci. You -" _Like them_ , he almost says, but that's a strong statement, and without being certain of its verisimilitude he probably shouldn't go throwing it before the court - "know. Jael and Marci."

Matt's expression suggests he does, in fact, know. It also suggests he would rather not.

Foggy sighs, and gives up the nudging as a lost cause. “What are you two doing here?”

The thing is, Marci’s always dressed to kill, so her outfit offers no clues. Her tight dark rinse jeans and slinky scoop-neck top could be ‘just stopped in on our way to a party’ clothes, or bona fide study-night casual clothes, or ‘planning to harvest all the best morsels of Jael’s tasty, tasty brain with hopefully no witnesses’ clothes. 

Jael's brain is genuinely tasty. If it's the latter, Foggy can't blame her.

Oh God. Alcohol’s turned Matt into a koala. It's turning Foggy into a zombie.

Marci says, “We’re here getting our educational dollar’s worth? Other people besides Murdock are actively trying to graduate with full honors, Foggy.”

There’s a speculative look in Jael’s eyes. “Maybe Murdock’s given up on that.”

“Drinks are allowed in this library,” Matt mutters.

“Yeah they are, buddy.” Foggy pats Matt's arm, which is probably a mistake, because it encourages the hand that isn't already clinging to Foggy's person to latch on. “I may have suggested a BYOB study session. Which, in retrospect, maaay have been a little misguided. Could you guys sit with him for a minute? Just long enough for me to grab a printout from the lab upstairs?”

And go to the bathroom. And just - breathe.

"Sure, babysit a grown man, why not? I charge by the hour," Marci says, dropping into a chair.

Foggy expects some resistance to this plan from Matt, but at the first mention of Foggy leaving he’s slipping his hands away and folding them in front of his book. “Okay,” Foggy says, easing up from his chair, trying to keep his head from spinning too badly at the sudden change in altitude, and his feet on board with the idea of walking. “Back in a minute, buddy. Marci, don't eat him.”

"Hardly. Not sweet enough for me." Marci flicks her fingers towards the elevator. "Go."

 

_10:03pm_

Jael's gone. It's just Matt and Marci, and Matt's got his earbuds in and his shoulders hunched turtle-style almost up to his ears.

“Okay, what happened?” Foggy asks, stopping at Marci's chair. He hopes his expression conveys the depths to which he is unimpressed.

“Murdock was verbally abusive. Jael left.”

Foggy scoffs. To make it perfectly clear, he says, “I'm scoffing.”

“I don't really care what you're doing,” Marci says, rising to her feet. “He told Jael that his cologne smelled like the mold growing beneath a kitchen sink in an apartment built in the 1930’s. Very specific with his insults, Murdock. Then he said Jael was violating EPA toxic air pollutants standards, and _then_ he pulled up the regulations and had his computer read them out to us. That's when Jael left.”

“And you stayed for, what? Blackmail material? Or -” Foggy grins - “because you knew I would like it if you did? That's it, right?”

“Please. Blackmail, obviously.” Marci smoothes a long strand of hair into place. “And because I knew you would owe me. Not because I think he can't take care of himself.”

That's a touchy sentence, and Foggy's eyes flick immediately over to Matt, hoping he hasn't heard it. “It's not -” he whispers fiercely, “it's not anything - you saw him when you got here. That's all.”

“Oh, we're talking about that? I thought you wanted to conspicuously ignore it.”

“Buddy system,” Foggy says firmly. “Every buddy needs a buddy when they're like that.”

Marci rolls her eyes. “He accessed EPA hazardous waste regulations in, like, four clicks. I don't think he's as out of it as you think he is.”

“That's just Matt. He can be totally wasted, or half-asleep, or out of it with a headache and then just, _snap_ , pull it together and be back in the game. Kinda freaky, honestly. But I mean, look.” Foggy gestures. “He’s humming at his fingertips.”

Matt is. Hands up near his face, pressing finger after finger against his thumbs and humming tunelessly.

Pointedly, Marci looks from Matt’s abandoned book, to Matt, and back to Foggy again. “He's telling us it's hard to read when we're standing here talking about him. Right, Murdock?”

Dammit.

Marci pats Foggy on the shoulder. “I'll leave you boys to it. Have - well.” She shrugs. “Whatever. Night.”

 

_10:05pm_

Matt's drunk. 

If Matt is a work of art - and, might as well face it, he always has been in Foggy’s book - unhappiness is something that usually lurks at the edges of the canvas, throwing jagged shadows that Matt tries to paint over with reserve and politeness. It's not usually laid out in stark, obvious lines.

Except when it is.

“Sorry I left you, bud,” Foggy says, sliding back into his chair. “I just needed -”

_To spend long minutes in front of the bathroom mirror, pressing a wet paper towel to my stupid pink-flushed face and trying to mellow out my stupid racing heart._

“- this article for Wen’s class. I'm old-fashioned, I like to run a highlighter over an actual piece of paper sometimes.” Matt’s popped one earbud out. His shoulders are still all hunched up, and Foggy bumps lightly against him. “You already got that one, right? Right format and everything?”

Matt mumbles something. Clears his throat. “Yeah. Yeah, she's good about that. Um. If - we can leave whenever you want.”

Matt's drunk, but maybe... maybe Marci wasn't entirely wrong, either. The koala and the turtle (make that snapping turtle, if Marci’s to be believed) - alcohol might color them in with big, bold strokes, but they're always part of Matt, aren't they? Just like the part of Foggy that, wasted or not, secretly always kind of wants to take on lampposts with Matt's cane.

“Hey, hey, no leaving.” Foggy squeezes Matt’s shoulder and leaves his hand there, palm pressing against his back. “Got nowhere else I'd rather be.” 

Maybe Matt hears the sincerity in Foggy’s voice, or feels it in his fingers, because he unturtles ever so slightly, and the muscles beneath Foggy's hand begin to relax. “Okay,” he says. “Okay.”

“Aaaand I've got enough resources here for another round of drinks, what do you say?”

“Any more rounds and you'll be picking me up off the floor, Foggy.”

“Hey, I totally could. Never doubt.”

Matt makes a noise that Foggy is happy to translate as recognition of his muscley prowess, so he decides to really dig in with his fingers and demonstrate the strength of his grip. And in that moment, beneath his hand, he feels the turtle shell fall away.

Foggy’s breath catches. 

Letting his hand slide off Matt’s shoulder, he stretches his arm along the back of Matt's seat. It's a movie theater move. It's sort of ridiculous. It -

It works.

Matt melts against Foggy's side like the sweetest pat of butter. His head lands on Foggy's chest, just above his heart, and Foggy wraps his hand around Matt's seriously firm bicep and tucks him even closer. “So that article,” he says quietly. “If you want, I could read it out loud? If your hands are getting tired?”

The smile Matt shoots up at him, craning his neck in an attempt to make sure it connects, is answer enough.

Tort law will never be the language of romance, not even among law students, but tonight, in a deserted library basement, on their little island in a sea of dusty books - tonight, it's more than that. Realer. Tonight, it’s intimacy. 

It’s not in the words, oh no, those are dry and precise as ever, but in the feel of them as they rumble softly in his throat, pitched low because that's all it takes to bridge the short distance between his mouth and Matt's ear. And in the feel of Matt's cheek against his chest; the solid warmth of him against Foggy's side; the strength of him, gone easy and pliant under Foggy's hand.

Foggy reads and reads, taking in very little of the actual words. He’ll definitely have to sit down with this article again sometime; will Matt? What is _he_ listening to? Liability doctrines, or the simple sound of Foggy's voice?

Maybe he can hear more than that, with his ear to Foggy's chest. Maybe he can hear his breath. Maybe he can hear his heart. 

Which, oh yeah, is still racing, absolutely still racing, but maybe it's not quite so stupid as Foggy had thought?

“You should stop,” Matt says, stirring against Foggy. “Drink something.”

“You saying I'm too sober?” Foggy jokes, but he realizes Matt's right - there's a rasp in his voice that he hadn't even noticed, one that’s soft but definitely scratchy, and now that he thinks about it, wetting his throat is a great idea. Until he tries it. “Ugh, God, you were right, this stuff is disgusting hot.”

Dick that he is, Matt twists around and _beams_. It's the loveliest asshole grin Foggy's ever seen. “Yeah, yeah,” Foggy says. “You can knock that off any time. Listen -”

“I always do,” Matt says, snorting happily to himself, like he's made a joke he’s proud of.

“ _Listen_ ,” Foggy repeats, “I want you to hear this, because if things get weird here in a minute, I want you to either forget them entirely, or remember them as being all my fault. Got it?”

“How weird?” Matt's eyebrows scrunch.

“Well, you’re involved, so we're talking the upper reaches of the scale,” Foggy says, before sliding his palm over Matt's cheek and angling Matt’s head just so. Now _here’s_ a part of Matt he's never been properly introduced to before: his strong, firm jaw, a little stubbly here at the end of the day, fitting perfectly in Foggy's hand.

It's not weird. 

Matt must agree. He nudges into Foggy's hand like a satisfied cat - an _extremely_ satisfied cat, judging by his sudden blissful thank-you-for-the-cream expression. And that's exactly the encouragement Foggy needs to introduce himself to another part of Matt, one he's wanted to meet for a long time but never quite imagined he would. Pink and soft and so, so expressive, and parted just right, like a door left waiting for Foggy to nudge open.

And Foggy has a feeling - no, it's fact, it's incontrovertible, because when he closes his eyes, when he closes that last bit of distance, the first touch confirms it -

He and Matt's lips are going to be very good friends indeed.

 

_two weeks later_

Foggy loves his new library friends. Every single one of them. Thank God he doesn't have to pick a BFF; it would take the world’s worst game of eeny-meeny-miny-moe to choose.

He's a huge fan of Matt's mouth, and he's ready and willing to express that appreciation. For all that Matt normally wears the expression of a man facing the gallows when he's forced to linger in a public restroom, he's the one doing the dawdling tonight. He's got Foggy crowded against the wall near the sinks, and he’s kissing his way from the apple of Foggy’s cheek to his mouth, lips tripping soft and light over Foggy’s skin, while the strong lines of his body say a very firm hello to Foggy and his hips press the message home.

Foggy’s dick says hello right back. Nudges up against Matt - _me, me, don't forget about me!_ and Matt's thigh, pal that it is, doesn't. It slots beautifully between Foggy’s legs, and Foggy clutches at Matt’s shoulder as he squirms closer to get better acquainted.

Matt's thigh can count him in its fan club, too.

That first night, he'd been so careful not to let things go beyond kissing, even though Matt turned out to be one of the world’s handsiest kissers, and had shifted into full koala mode, wrapping around Foggy like he was his favorite eucalyptus tree. And Foggy’d been ready for weirdness the next morning, braced for it, completely expecting Matt to go full-on amnesia victim on him; but instead Matt had slipped out of the room while they were both hungover as dirt and returned with coffee and a kiss, the former proffered somewhere near Foggy’s left hand, the latter dropped in the vicinity of Foggy’s eyebrow.

“If, if that was weird, you'll forget it happened when I snap my fingers,” Matt had said, and Foggy had said, “Oh, are you a hypnotist now?”, then grabbed his hand and kissed his palm before he could go rattling either of their brains with a bunch of gratuitous snapping.

But now, tonight, lips are greeting lips, and such a nice greeting it is: good pressure, good suction - Matt tends to capture Foggy’s bottom lip between his own and slooowly pull - and when Foggy slides his tongue over Matt's, a noise slips out of Matt's throat that makes Foggy’s dick leap.

There's another noise from the doorway. It sounds like someone choking on their own tongue, and Foggy’s eyes fly open. Jael’s standing there, his initial shock fading into a complete lack of surprise. He also looks expectant, like he just assumes they're going to slink out and give him the room.

“Matt,” Foggy says. He figures it's his duty to fill him in. “Matt. Company.”

“Mm. Thought I heard ‘im. Not to mention. Smell.” His thumb doesn't stop sweeping over Foggy’s throat, but his thigh does stop rocking gently up between Foggy’s legs, which is probably a good thing all around, because while getting crazy turned on in a library restroom turns out to be a thing Foggy’s into, he's not sure coming in his pants is, and coming in his pants in front of a classmate is definitely on the ‘no thank you’ list.

“If he doesn't like me offending his eyes, he should stop offending my nose,” Matt adds, lips dragging against Foggy’s cheek, and, you know, that's a point. Foggy really can't say fairer than that.

So he shrugs at Jael, whether Jael can see it or not with Matt Murdock, Human Koala plastered against Foggy’s front. “I'm always a champion of compromise,” Foggy says, and gets back to the business at hand.

**Author's Note:**

> I [tumble](http://significantowl.tumblr.com)! :)


End file.
